Bodyguard/Husband Read Online Free Page A

kid.
    Dismissing thoughts of his mother, he settled back and considered what he knew about the case.
    The Division’s profiler, Eric Baldwyn, had provided Jack with a personality sketch of the UnSub, FBI shorthand for an unidentified subject. Eric was a strange guy, but he was the best profiler Jack had ever worked with. He had an uncanny knack for nailing asubject’s quirks and oddities, and his profile had made the difference in more than one case.
    Jack would keep in touch with Eric throughout the case, working with him to isolate the most likely suspects in this worst kind of stalking case. Most stalkers never turned deadly, but Jack knew from painful experience that some could.
    Eric had told him the UnSub fit the classic serial-killer profile in many ways. He was almost certainly male, probably relatively young, late twenties or early thirties. If he wasn’t young, then he was emotionally immature, an underachiever in a job that didn’t make a lot of demands on him.
    Eric also thought the killer’s fascination with Holly may have begun years ago, perhaps even in childhood, and that his erotomanic obsession had developed over a long period of time.
    Thanks to Eric, Jack already had many pieces of the puzzle. Most of it fit with Jack’s own experience. What he didn’t have was the most important piece. He didn’t know what that piece was, but he knew where it was. The vital information that would lead to the killer was locked inside Holly’s brain.
    He looked at the lovely young woman sitting beside him. He probably knew almost as much about her as anyone in her hometown. Her uncle had seen to that. Virgil McCray had given Jack a terse but vivid image of Holly. One that made more sense now that he’d met her. He hadn’t been able to reconcile McCray’s description with the photo he’d sent.
    “Holly takes care of everything around here,” Virgil had said. “There’s nothing she wouldn’t do for her family or her friends. Everybody loves her. We depend on Holly.”

    She looked like someone who could be depended upon. She had a determined lift to her chin, a hint of compassion and caring in her eyes.
    But Jack needed more than the view of her that her family and friends saw. He needed to get inside her head, understand her from the inside, see people the way she saw them, look at the town through her eyes.
    He had worked a couple of cases of women who’d killed their husbands or lovers, so he knew he couldn’t completely discount Holly as a suspect. His gut instinct told him she was no killer. He never went by his gut, though. In his line of work, logic and facts told the tale. He’d wait for the facts.
    Jack almost felt sorry for her, because he’d seen something else in her wide-eyed gaze. A determined innocence. He hardened his heart. Sooner or later she had to face the truth. It would fall to him to strip away that innocence.
    He didn’t realize he was staring at her until she squirmed, then lifted her chin.
    “Why are you looking at me like that?” she asked, her voice full of strain.
    He frowned. He could already see that she was not going to sit back quietly and let him do his job. Maybe it was time she understood the depth of the danger she was in.
    “Tell me, Holly Frasier.” He braced himself and fixed her with the stare that had unnerved more than one suspect. “Who keeps killing the men who love you?”

Chapter Two
    Jack got the reaction he’d wanted from his bald statement. Holly’s face drained of color and she lifted a trembling hand to her mouth.
    He took her hand and squeezed it gently. “You’re not going to faint on me, are you?”
    She shook her head.
    He pulled a small notebook out of his pocket and patted his shirt pocket. “Got a pen?”
    Her shocked gaze was still on him. He waited. After a couple of seconds she groped blindly beneath the seat and dug into her purse. She came up with a pen.
    “No, keep it,” he said, handing her the notebook, turned to a blank